Whether for a day, a week or years, Edith Phillips opened her heart and her home to more than 120 children others did not want, had abused, neglected or had labeled unadoptable because they were ill or disabled.
Mrs. Phillips and her late husband, Leonard, took in their first foster child in 1948. Her last, a son, lived with her until 2003 when her failing health prompted her to sell the home in Oak Lawn where she had lived for 45 years.
Mrs. Phillips, 86, died of congestive heart failure Friday, Nov. 11 in her daughter’s home in Tavares, Fla.
“She enjoyed the kids. She wanted to see them prosper and grow. She wanted to teach them values,” said her daughter Joan Gifford.
Mrs. Phillips was born in Kankakee in 1919. Her father died when she was 11, leaving behind a widow and five other children. The family could not afford to send Mrs. Phillips to high school. She moved to Chicago when she was 15 and became a nanny.
“She always loved babies. It’s no wonder she became a foster parent,” Gifford said. “She loved God first, then children, then animals.”
At 19, Mrs. Phillips met her husband, Leonard, a Protestant minister, through friends. The couple had four children of their own and were married for 63 years until Leonard’s death in 2001.
Although Mrs. Phillips did not have an extended formal education, Gifford said her mother had the ability to mend children’s broken spirits.
Greg Townsend was one of many foster children who flourished under Mrs. Phillip’s care.
Townsend, 48, a disc jockey and video producer in San Diego, had been abused then rejected by his adoptive family.
At the age of 3, he tried to swallow a bottle of pills and was placed in a state mental facility from which he was released after a doctor realized what he needed was a loving home. He was placed with the Phillips when he was 5 and lived with them until his teenage years.
“I came to her at a critical point in my life when I needed TLC, and she provided it,” Townsend said. “She was a very simple woman. She didn’t travel, but the riches she provided are unfathomable.”
Other survivors include another daughter, Judy Trimingham; two sons, David and Ken; a sister, Norma Faford; 14 grandchildren; and 26 great-grandchildren.
A funeral service will be held at 11 a.m. Thursday in Hills Funeral Home, 10201 S. Roberts Rd., Palos Hills.
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amannion@tribune.com
